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Origin of Sauternes Noble Rot

There are two legends about the origin of Sauternes Noble Rot, both of which are somewhat mysterious.

The first legend: In 1836, there was a Bordeaux wine merchant of German origin, Fock, whose winery was Chateau La Tour Blanche in the village of Boom. He wanted to wait until the long autumn rainy season was over before starting. Harvest grapes. As a result, after the sun came out, the grapes shrank and dried, and “noble rot” occurred, and he got the ideal sweet liquor, which was a great success. Perhaps what is at work here is that the owner comes from the Rhine with distant memories of viticulture and the serendipity of success.

The second kind of legend is also very accidental: in 1847, the owner of the Chateau d’Yquem of Lvsa-Lvsi, the Marquis de Lusalius, returned late from a trip to Russia. Grape harvesting begins. God help, the “noble rot” performed well in those days and produced the best wine.

According to historians, from the end of the 16th century, the Dutch merchants who dominated the maritime trade bought large quantities of white wine. Some white wines are fired to produce cognac, while others are simply sweet wines. The Dutch add sugar, alcohol, potions, and infusions of plants to their wines, aiming to satisfy customers in northern countries, where people like to drink sweet drinks. Many Dutch people came to Bordeaux in the 17th century to get their hands on the vineyards.

Apparently, at their request, the wines of the Bassac Territory turned to high-sugar sweet liquors, but at the time they were not made from “noble rot” grapes. Bassac’s territory roughly includes today’s Bassac and Sauternes, which were very famous at that time. Beginning in 1613, the nobles of the Bassac Territory began to compile a local “Guide to Fine Wines”.

In 1647, the Bordeaux jury and Dutch businessmen jointly compiled the “Wine Tax Items”, in which today’s wines from five villages and towns in the Sauternes wine region are listed in the second grade, with a tax amount of 84 to 105 silver coins, second only to the famous Bordeaux wineries. (The tax amount is 95 to 105 silver coins). The late harvest practice in Bassac and Sauternes is also clearly documented in the 1666 archives.

Two-thirds of the chateaux of our grand crus today started planting vines on a large scale at the end of the 17th century, when nobles invested heavily in their territories, an effort that continued throughout the 18th century. Even so, around 1740, local wines were sold for much less than Médoc and Graff wines, which were four times more expensive than local wines at 1500-1800 silver coins.

Of course, compared with the shochu produced in the region between the two seas, the Dutch are still willing to pay double the price for the sweet liquor of Bassac and Sauternes.

In the early 18th century, the local viticulture area was mainly along the Garonne River. Between 1770 and 1810, it expanded to the following places such as Bohm and Sauternes. In the history of the development of local sweet white wine, the owner family of Ygan winery (the Sauvage family and later the Lussalus family, they also owned St Cricq, Filhot, Couter winery) played a great role, they are white grapes The earliest practitioners of seed selection and late harvesting.

Jefferson, who would later become the third president of the United States, visited Bordeaux in 1787. After returning to the United States, he asked the American consul in Bordeaux to order 85 cases of 12-bottle wine for him, including the Sauternes liqueur that he asked for the Count de Lusalus, the owner of Ygan. In his self-built wine classification catalog, he did not forget the sweet white wines of Bassac, Paneque and Sauternes.

These wines are also recorded in the pen of the Governor of French Guiana, who wrote in 1741: “The locals wait for the grapes to go mouldy before harvesting…” He also wrote: “Many repeated pickings are required to ensure the sugar enough…”. These all prove that there were already “noble rot” grapes at that time.